I Love NY! Bookcase Finished

Back when I taught science, I learned about a free professional development opportunity at the American Museum of Natural History.  It was funded by a STEM grant and provided free per diem coverages (for you non-teachers, that means that the school gets money for a substitute during my training).  There was no way my principal could say no.  This is the third and final year of the program, and it is so wonderful.  I get to interact with thoughtful, educated individuals in a world class museum, and work with fossils and sequence sturgeon DNA and the like. 

In addition to the thrill of attending the museum, I get the opportunity to go into Manhattan, which is rare for me nowadays.  I take an express bus and relax while someone else handles the driving.  It is so superior to the regular bus and subway - it is civilized; and expensive.  It goes up Sixth Avenue, starting at 34th Street, which is the southern end of the Fashion District.  Fabric stores, button stores, and bead stores are close to heaven on earth for this crafter.  The wonderful Free People coat that I picked up for a song at the Daffy's Going Out of Business sale popped some buttons, so I had to go to M & J Trimmings.  They have paillettes and Swarovski crystals, ribbon, tassels, nail head trim and all things I love.  I love New York shopping, especially the districts: lamp district, flower district, antique district, flea market district.  I picked up some great beads for mini pendant lamps, as well as some beads that will serve as accessories (owl beads!  A blue laughing Buddha head!  A skull!)  Where else can you score these things?  Oh, and the bag of small brass tubes will fashion another version of the Kelly Wearstler Kaleidoscope brass sculpture.  Oh, and I did end up getting new buttons for my coat after all.

The other news is that I finished painting the bookcase, and I added some accessories.  The clock, books, shell dish and canisters are all from the free Barbie bag, but painted silver and white.  The green rocket on the left is a doodad from my in-laws collection, and the sculpture on the right is a mica rock hot glued to a wooden game disk that I painted silver.  I have to do the same for the beads, because they don't stand up on their own.  I threw in random shells, but I will work on the styling a bit more in the future.  I needs more color.

 

Ta ta, cheerio.